Where’s Paco? Josiah doesn’t know, his girlfriend doesn’t know, someone at Delta might know. After all, Delta was supposed to load Josiah’s new dog on the same plane that Josiah got on. Paco didn’t land with them. Frantic, Josiah called around desperately before being told that Paco was safe and sound, being taken care of by Delta employees, who would put him on the next flight out. Paco wasn’t on that one either. More harried calls and Delta told Josiah Paco had “escaped” and the best they could do is refund his $200.00 pet transportation fee, but only as a “credit” for future Delta travel. That doesn’t do Josiah any good, as he’s vowed to never fly Delta again. Here’s his story, and more adorable/sad puppy pictures:
UPDATE: Delta Offers $380 Plus 2 More $200 Vouchers For Lost Pooch
UPDATE: Delta spokesperson Susan Elliott says, “This is extremely rare for a situation like this to happen.” She says that they are going to be offering Josiah “additional compensation as well as our sincere apology.”
UPDATE: Josiah says the dog was vaccinated four days prior to the flight for rabies, kennel cough, and giardia, and given two other drugs, Canigen L Canigen MHA2PPi. He says the vet told him that the dog only needed to be vaccinated 3 days before flying.
It should be noted that the rabies vaccine is not considered effective until 30 days after administration.
However, even if this was a factor, Josiah says he was not asked to show any proof of the dog’s shots and Delta personnel told that this would be asked for in customs in Detroit.
Hi, my name is Josiah and I recently travelled to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico with Delta Airlines, and I am so appalled by them I can’t stand it. I booked my flights online, and that part went smoothly, but that’s the only good part of my traveling with them. I flew out of Detroit Metro in the early morning of April 24th 2010, and flew to Atlanta to catch a transfer which would take me to Puerto Vallarta. After arriving about an hour late and having to run to catch my plane, they said that they weren’t boarding any more passengers, but were taking an extra fifteen minutes to load all the baggage on the plane. When we arrived in Puerto Vallarta I was informed that, along with most people who were on the original flight from Detroit, my baggage never left the Atlanta airport, and I had to wait until the next day to receive all of my clothes and necessities for traveling.
Now, while I know that this isn’t too out of the ordinary, and that airlines have baggage delayed quite commonly, the next issue is one that is completely unacceptable and should never happen regardless of circumstances. When in Mexico, my girlfriend and I rescued a stray dog which our hosts said had been seen all over the town. We took him to the vet’s, got him all of his shots, an eye infection treated, two baths to clean him from hundreds of dog ticks that were covering his whole body, and gave him the name Paco. After this treatment at the vet clinic, we had to spend multiple additional hours picking more ticks from his body. We soon discovered that this dog was a very lucky find, and that it would be loyal and friendly to my girlfriend and I. It would walk by my side along the beach and along the sidewalks, went to the washroom outside, didn’t bark at cars or other dogs, and would sleep on the bed next to us curled up in a ball quite contently. My girlfriend and I were both very excited to take him back home to Canada with us, and we quite readily paid for an airline approved pet carrier and the costs associated with checking a pet on an airplane to travel as baggage, as he was too big to be taken as carry-on.
Everything went smoothly traveling with AeroMéxico from Puerto Vallarta to Mexico City, where we had a five hour layover. We took the dog out so he could go to the bathroom and stretch his legs in-between our flights, and two hours before we departed from Mexico City to Detroit Metro we checked him with Delta for the flight. It took us a whole hour to check the dog because Delta said that the pet carrier we purchased was not big enough, despite the vet who treated the dog saying it was large enough, and it meeting all the criteria such as the dog being able to turn around and stand up. We spent the hour trying to convince the Delta employee that the carrier was large enough, and after seeing two separate supervisors, we had to sign a waiver saying that if my dog Paco received any injuries as a result of the size of the carrier, that Delta Airlines was not responsible.
After the fiasco of the size of the carrier being an issue, they assured us that Paco would be alright and transported safely to Detroit. However, when we arrived in Detroit and waited for twenty minutes at the pet claim, we began to suspect that something was wrong. We spent two hours in the Detroit Metro Airport trying to sort out what had happened to our dog, and we were told that it was never loaded on the plane in the first place, and that it was forgotten in Mexico City but would be cared for by Delta employees and walked, fed, watered, and would be sent on the next flight to Detroit, and then get delivered to my house in Ontario, Canada.
When I called Delta the following day to ask if Paco had been flown to Detroit yet, no one seemed to have any answers or have any idea about the location of my dog. I was shocked. I had been told explicitly that my dog was being cared for in Mexico City by Delta until he could be flown and delivered to me, and now they were telling me that they didn’t know where my dog was. I had my host in Mexico call the Mexico City Airport to get some answers, and she spent hours being transferred from person to person, each one having no idea what happened to my dog, she was finally told that my dog had somehow escaped from the carrier and disappeared. I do not believe for a second that Paco escaped from his carrier. It was a very secure hard plastic pet carrier with two locks and a metal wire door, and there is no way a small dog (he looked like a mix of a wiener dog and a jack russell) could scratch or break his way out of it.
If indeed he did somehow manage to escape from the carrier, why would I not have been informed of this in the first place? I was told that he was accounted for and being cared for in Mexico City, then that no one had any idea where he was, and then that he had escaped from the carrier.
There is no excuse for this kind of situation to take place, and I expect that when you pay to have a live animal flown with you to take him home, that Delta Airlines would take every precaution and action needed to make sure that is what happens. My dog is likely either still in his carrier in a corner, having not eaten or drank for over 48 hours, or he is lost in the Mexico City Airport terrified and starving.
The only thing Delta has tried to do to rectify this situation is offering their apology and refunding the cost for transporting a pet ($200.00USD) in a credit to be used with Delta Airlines. I think that this is completely absurd as there is no chance of me flying with Delta Airlines again.
That really sucks, Josiah. At the very least, Delta should give that $200 as a full refund. And as commenter tungstencoil points out, try asking them to return to you the dog carrier. It’s your property, and making them produce it could force some honesty out of the situation.
We’ve reached out to Delta for comment.
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This breaks my heart. Poor Paco.
Exactly. I cannot imagine how the owner & dog must feel. My family jokes that our dog is my “fuzzy son”- that anybody would “lose” a family member is just unimaginable.
Practical assessment: if he “got out of” the carrier (rather than them losing it), ask them to return the carrier. That may rustle up some honesty.
Gut assessment: wow… just…wow…awful… I can’t imagine.
Good thinking but It’s been two weeks.
I’m not sure it has been 2 weeks. He originally flew to Mexico April 24th, but the pictures in the post are dated May 1 and it sounded like they came back to Canada a couple days after that.
They have pictures of him on the beach, so at most it’s been one, possibly only a day or two
Carriers are sturdy and hard for dogs to get out of. What happens is workers open the door to pet the dog, or offer it some water, and when they open the door the dog scurries out (which is understandable as they may be afraid of traveling in a crate, especially a small dog that is used to being free.) It’s amazing how a dog can wiggle out even if the crate is only opened a small bit to pet it.
Horrible what happened to the pup. Hopefully he’s free and has a chance at survival, rather than a misplaced crate in a warehouse somewhere.
I adopted a year old Rhodesian Ridgeback in December. On the first day back to work after adopting him, I left him in a travel carrier that I’d used in the past for a Great Dane. When I returned home from work, I found my big puppy standing at the front window, waiting for me to return home. I went upstairs to find the carrier had been destroyed. It looked like he pulled the metal door so far into the carrier that it cracked the plastic and he was able to get out. It is possible to break out of a travel carrier…but I don’t know if Paco would have the strength to do that. Hopefully they will find Paco soon and reunite him with his new family.
Wow that is one strong dog of yours! No, Paco doesn’t look that destructive. He looks about the size of my Miniature Pinscher.
Ask them for the carrier NOW , and do not stop until they either return the carrier or admit they don’t know where it is. I would be suprised if they do actually know where it is. Document everything, and sue them. I swear I will contribute to your legal fees. This is heartbreaking and I pray the dog is OK!
Killing puppies? Now they are just screwing with us for fun. This is worst PR a company could get.
I know that this isn’t a comical situation. but would it be inappropriate to point out that they were beaten by US in the first round of WCIA? Is Comcast/C4G/Paypal/US Airways worse than this?
That round was voted on way before this story came out
If Delta and United had merged, maybe they would have beaten it to death with a guitar?
…Delta told Josiah Paco had “escaped” and the best they could do is refund his $200.00 pet transportation fee, but only as a “credit” for future Delta travel.
My jaw dropped.
They’re not even going to offer to LOOK for it?
Is it profitable for them to do it? If not, then they won’t bother. I’m sure if there was an extra fee for “Attempt to locate pet if lost” they would search though.
The airline industry will sacrifice customer service and comfort if it will make then an extra $1 a seat.
unfortunately the government sees pets as property so there is not any real legal recourse other then money refunded for the property, i really think that pets should be put into a separate category other then property, especially when most pets are considered part of the family, but who knows what category it would be or even if anything like that would be proposed.
Its similar to that pet food recall a few years back, many pets died but the only recourse for the pet owners was small claims court for the amount the pet was worth
Good enough for me. I won’t fly Delta anymore either. Good luck locating Paco.
Seconded.
Can you just bring dogs into the country like that? Aren’t there quarantines?
The dog was going to Canada, so Canadian law would probably control. However, I’m not sure the Canadians have laws, though I’m told the cities near the borders catch stray Americans and burn them for heat in the winter.
Well, it does get pretty cold up there…
But Americans, at least according to the media/scientists, are a generally obese people. Do you think fat people burn better/generate more heat than thin people?
Well, whale blubber is a fuel, so maybe…
It depends on the country and the dog’s history. Sometimes it’s just a matter of filling out a lot of paperwork and proving a dog’s vaccination history.
Unfortunately, I think the problems started earlier than that. Paco was a stray, and if he had never been vaccinated before, he would have had to be vaccinated at least 30 days before entering the US – if there wasn’t any paperwork indicating he had his rabies vaccination, either he would be denied entry (Josiah should have been alerted if this was the case), he would be taken to be inspected (again, Josiah should have been alerted), or the dog would have been confined until he could get his rabies shot. Mexico is not a rabies-free country, so vaccination or an exemption of such (if Paco was too young) would have been absolutely necessary.
Josiah should check with customs because you can’t just bring an animal into the US. You need documentation, even if the final destination is Canada. Josiah mentioned a lot of medical treatment for his eye infection and ticks and such, but never mentioned vaccinations. Given all of Paco’s problems (and please don’t flame me for this), I wonder whether Josiah and his girlfriend actually got all of Paco’s paperwork taken care of properly.
The article does say he “got all of his shots” during the initial vet visit but I agree it’s not clear if these were the necessary vaccinations. Not to mention the paperwork issue, which is an important piece of information. Makes me wonder if the dog didn’t get put on the plane originally because some airline employee knew he didn’t have the proper paperwork, and things escalated from there. That’s just me totally speculating though.
Yeah, I caught that part after the fact. Oops on my part. But even so, if they got there April 24 and flew out in May, Paco didn’t qualify for entry based on the fact that he didn’t get his rabies shot at least 30 days beforehand – so this means that (barring the worst case scenario which is that Paco is wandering the streets or that someone stole him) Paco is in quarantine at the airport or they denied entry. In either case, Paco has to have identification on him, so if Paco hasn’t been stolen or has been left on the street, someone should have been able to get ahold of Josiah! But then again, I’m assuming the dog tag had Josiah’s information on it, and not just “Paco.”
I thought about bringing my rabbit abroad with me, but it turned out that she would have to have been quarantined for 60 days, if I remember correctly. There’s no way that Paco was quarantined in that short of a visit.
But I think that if Delta does have the dog in quarantine, they should be alerting Josiah.
Eesh, you would have had to quarantine your rabbit? I didn’t know they did that. At least you could have had your rabbit under the seat though, right? Unless she was a flemish giant.
If all that were true, then the dog would have been refused earlier along the trip (note that the OP talked to two different supervisors just to get the damn CARRIER approved), and they would have been informed the dog was in quarantine somewhere. Sorry, OP blaming fail. Got anything else?
I wasn’t blaming him for his problems, if you were actually paying attention. I was pointing out where things might have been troublesome from the beginning, and offering clues as to where the dog might be. We’d LIKE to think that Delta has its ducks in a row and would inform the OP properly of what was going on, but it’s not like that happens to often, now does it? We’d like for Delta to follow procedure so we can determine that if A happens, B is the result, and C is my course of action. But Delta doesn’t operate totally in the realm of common sense and they do dumb stuff like not tell anyone that they may or may not have a pet, or maybe…I don’t know…NOT send someone’s dog on the plane with them?
My brother brought his cat from rural China to the U.S. with no quarantine or anything. I’m guessing Mexico is not any worse than rural China with regards to animal disease.
This story…just kills me. Makes me want to go all PETA on Delta’s ass.
How will killing more animals make you feel any better?
PETA would have killed the dog, too, and preached puppy eugenics.
The world would be a better place without PETA.
Seriously??? I will never fly Delta. Most pets are most beloved than some humans!
I believe that everyone should boycott delta now… I can see misplacing a piece of luggage from time to time, its understandable, but to misplace a living breathing animal is just horrible. If i ever need to fly my dog somewhere you can bet he’ll never be on Delta.
United breaks people’s guitars, but Delta abandons your dog! WTF? At least Paco has a collar with a tag and if he did escape, maybe someone will call Josiah. I wish they had thought about putting a chip in Paco in case, but who would imagine that Delta could leave behind his dog and then lose him altogether?
That’s the first thing I thought of – a microchip. This story is so sad, I couldn’t imagine. I usually like my dogs more than my kids (they’re teenagers, trust me they can be pretty unlikable at times).
Oh no! This is so sad
Losing the dog is bad enough, but it is more offensive to me that Delta’s response was a $200 credit. Delta sucks!
This is incredibly unacceptable. I can’t believe Delta felt that offering him a $200 voucher was an appropriate response for LOSING HIS DOG! It sucks that this happened to you Josh, but thank you for sending this story in, as it ensures I will never fly Delta again. Delta, what the hell is wrong with you?
*Josiah
Looks like I need a third cup of coffee.
I’m hoping that the agreement he signed didn’t screw him over…
After all, according to him, he signed a waiver that if anything happened to the dog, Delta wouldn’t be liable.
It sounds like the waiver covered if anything happened specifically as a result of the size of the carrier.
Let’s just see how that waiver holds up in a civil court. Hey, perhaps it would, but I doubt Delta would want to publicly fight this case, so even if they did have some convenient fine print, they’d probably want to settle pretty damn quickly. And they deserve to be put in that situation if you ask me.
Among other things, they should have immediately offered to put the guy on the next flight back to Mexico City to help look for his dog. I mean, holy smokes, this is somebody’s dog we’re talking about, not an old sweater. Disgusting.
Let’s see, Delta tells you, we won’t be responsible if something happens, and when something happens they are supposed to do something?
Well, if Delta actually *felt* that way, they would not have bold faced lied to him that the dog was fine and being looked after. They are scared, and were hoping to keep him at ease while they did a search. Delta lies because they feel that they are liable.
“sign a waiver saying that if my dog Paco received any injuries as a result of the size of the carrier, that Delta Airlines was not responsible. “
This is heart shattering, I hope for all the best and this is taken care of. I would call my lawyer immediately, judge me, I don’t care. I would seek the most intense retribution possible.
Coupon, I agree with you with one caveat. If the airline honestly made a big effort to find my dog and apologized to me, I would leave it be. But if they are being douches like this, I say sue the hell out of them
I can’t say much, but I hope someone here in Mexico is taking care of Paco. I do wish there is a charitable soul on the airport, maybe not working with Delta because they have shown they are pretty much douches. Still, someone else, maybe from the people who clean up the facilities or from another airline. Do keep us posted about whatever happens with Paco.
I hope he doesn’t end up as a Taco… sorry! Sorry! I couldn’t help it.
When do the WCIA 2011 nominations open up?
maybe we need a Pro Bowl or All Star 2010 with BoA vs Delta. This is exactly why i would never even think of flying with my dogs.
Further rules clarification for Worst Company In America needed. Now, does Consumerist mean “Worst Company in the United States of America”, or “Worst Company in North America?” To preempt future conflict, what about South America? I only ask because he was flying from Mexico to Canada, so if we treat the Golden Poo as a national treasure, Delta’s efforts in this case are disqualified.
Man, I hope this hits the mainstream news. I hope Delta gets to sautee in this one. Heart breaking.
Aside from the knee jerk reaction of kidnapping a Delta exec and holding him in a basement cage in total darkness, I think the only recourse here is to sue in small claims court over the loss of the animal and file a police report of animal cruelty.
Why animal cruelty? How else would the animal escape if the cage was being treated badly enough to reach device failure.
I think the knee jerk reaction of kidnapping a delta exec is actually very reasonable.
That’s not a reasonable reaction at all!
Reasonable would be stuffing said executive into a small carrier and leaving them in the corner of an airport until Paco is returned.
…and offering the executive’s family $200 as compensation.
in visa gift cards.
You’re to nice, make it a travel voucher.
Jenn, I like your evil style.
Read this answer to find out what heppens… Delta treats the lost animal as if it were lost luggage http://www.gadling.com/2008/02/10/delta-pays-2-800-for-a-lost-dog-worth-20-000/
Lawsuit, and/or a police report, would be messy and maybe impossible. See my post below, but the crux of it is that this didn’t happen in the US, so the power of the Courts and US Law Enforcement is probably very limited.
Unfortunately, small claims courts (the laws) in the US treat dogs as “property” and not companions, so people are only normally awarded the value of the animal (which is usually nominal). I’ve always found this so unfair because dogs and other companion animals are so much more to most people. I would NEVER call my dogs my property!
I have no idea what I’d do in this case. I probably wouldn’t ever fly with my dog for fear of something like this happening.
Does anyone with more knowledge than me about such things think that Delta could be charged with cruelty to animals?
I think there would have to be some evidence that something bad actually happened to Paco. I’m hoping that someone from the airport just decided to keep him… which is wrong, but at least would mean that nothing bad actually happened to the dog.
In theory, at least…
I suspect the dog didn’t escape. It’s like that one of the airport employees just took him home for his kids or for himself.
While I’m generally not one to scream “lawsuit,” this is a situation where one is warranted. That said, suing would probably be a mess. You’ve got an incident that occurred in Mexico, affecting the “property” of a Canadian, and effected by a (likely Mexican) subsidiary or contractor for a US Airline.
I think you’re right. This story sounds more like someone else fell in love with Paco’s charms and they’re trying to cover it up.
Flying with a pet is ALWAYS a risky and dangerous proposition. Pets get lost, injured, and frequently DIE while being transported on commercial air liners. Here’s a full report that contains the aggregate numbers from March 2005 – February 2010.
http://www.thirdamendment.com/animals.html
Unfortunately, the numbers are not scaled by the number of pets flown by the airline, but you might be able to do some correction in your head. The thing that sticks out? Delta doesn’t injure or kill many animals relative to the number of animals flown (especially wrt Alaska, Continental, etc), but they do tend to lose them.
Yeah I’ve always wanted to do travel with my dog but the sheer danger of a dog on a plane terrifies me.
I think for a while it was something like 1 in 4 dogs didn’t make it to their destination when traveling via airplane.
1 in 4? Stop making things up based on some hazy memory of something someone told you once.
Or find some stats, a newspaper article or anything to back up that it was ever that bad.
Good information. I must admit, my first thought is that the dog died during transport and they just don’t want to admit it. A friend of mine who works in the airline industry has told me that when pets do die aboard planes (and I won’t even go into how they die), they first try to tell the owner that they lost the pet. I don’t know how often he’s had to do this, or if he was just pulling my chain because of how appalled I was about dogs dying in cargo.
That’s so sad. I will never take my pets on an airplane. It scares me to think of how they might be treated! And of course, the chance that they could DIE. No thanks!
How can say pets “frequently DIE” when you do not have any data to support this claim? All the data shows that is that 135 animals died in the 4.5 years from May 2005 through February 2010. Without knowing how many animals in total flew during that time period, you do not know if that death rate is frequent, infrequent, or somewhere in between.
The saddest thing is that it looks like this dog’s life was really starting to turn around after suffering a lot. But then Delta decided to shit on that and then lie about what happened. Everyone should post this up on their FB, twitter, etc.
posted it to my FB – my twitter is sadly lacking in followers…not that i get on it much, lol
Mexican puppy? They probably asked the dog for its papers at the Arizona border but the dog couldn’t produce any so bye-bye Paco.
I’ve got a sneaky feeling Delta didn’t ‘lose’ the dog. One of the employees thought the dog was way too cute and took it as their own.
Good thing Paco didn’t get lost in China…
What’s funny is that if he had been lost in Shanghai, Beijing, or Hong Kong, he’d be living a life of luxury on a silk pillow. I’ve read a lot of articles on dog ownership in China – the people in the cities dote on their dogs like they were children. The people in the rural areas….well, don’t get lost there if you’re a dog. But in the cities, a lot of people have dogs as pets and are trying to get the government to ban their use as food.
Hope there’s no rabies going around: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14139027/
Wow I feel so bad for him and the dog, I would be livid if this happened to me. Sounds like multiple EECB are in order from Josiah and us.
this animal is a living and breathing creature. A 200.00 voucher is thought of as compensation? Who at delta makes up these things?
Ohh wait,…they misplace people too. So I guess losing your dog isnt important to them.
On another note, was the OP aware that in order to take the dog out of the country, proper vaccinations are needed? Clearly the OP in this story isnt at fault even if he is…….The doggy picture gives him immunity
It says in the story that they took him to the vet and got him all the required vax.
Well, what Josiah wrote was, “got him all of his shots,” which doesn’t have to mean vaccinations. It could have been medications. And as some vaccinations are not mandatory under normal circumstances but may be absolutely required if one is to take an animal into the US, maybe Paco didn’t get all of his shots.
Oh my god, come on dude. Medications? Most vaccines for animals are in syringe form. Most medications are in pill or liquid form, especially for antibiotics. It’s safe to assume that the OP took the dog to a vet that wasn’t in the back alley behind a run down shack. And it’s pretty safe to assume that a vet would give a dog found as a stray, who had obviously been on it’s own for a bit (as evidenced by the ticks), the required boosters such as the Rabies vaccine and/or lyme disease shot. You’re just grasping at straws here.
unfortunately, dogs are seen as property, not animals, when it comes to a law suit – so while i think this is horrendous, and Delta is ridiculous for offering only $200, the OP also cant expect thousands for the dog either.
THe problem with animals in civil cases is that animals are seen as property. THere is no way to assess the value of something when the value is only in the eye of the beholder – if they wre able to sue for 10k because they “loved ” the dog 10k worth, everyone would just claim they love their dog 10m worth….so unfortunate as it is, there really isnt much they can expect from this.
again, delta = major fail, and they should have offered not only the $200 pet fee back, but the entire flight, plus $1000 or something….it obviously wont replace the sentiment of the dog, or the value to the op, but it would at least be a nice gesture and make them feel like Delta at least cared at ALL.
I think best case scenarios is an airline or airport employee stole Paco to have as a pet. Worst case scenario is Paco is dead.
Did Delta return the carrier?
I have flown several times with my dog in baggage. The airline (American) made me zip tie her crate door in all four corners. I assumed this was standard practice. Yikes.
I have flown several times with my dog in baggage. The airline (American) made me zip tie her crate door in all four corners. I assumed this was standard practice. Yikes.
I just can’t believe this! Once again, an airline has one job. Transport you and your luggage to a destination and they can’t ephing do it. That is ridiculous!
Wow this is very scary to me. Delta is frequently used for pet rescue transports. The dog was in their care and they lost him. At the very least if they seriously cant produce my dog I would want all money for the vet bills, the crate and the plane ticket. If you bought one from a breeder then paid to fly it and “it got lost” I would expect the same. If he did run away as they suggest, I guess there is some solace in knowing that you left him in much better shape then he was before you gave him love.
I’d ask for the $200 credit in writing hand delivered then when they arrive with the letter kidnap the fool and offer Delta a refund on the mileage on the car he drove to make the delivery.
Genius!
The only problem it would just be some schmuck from a courier company and Delta wouldn’t give a damn.
honestly? if i had stock in delta, id be taking it out of my portfolio.
but delta sucks, so i would never have their shitty stock in my portfolio. if i had a portfolio.
but damn sure i wont fly delta. losing someone’s dog? id rather them lose an in-law than my dog. actually, id pay extra for them to lose an in-law or two
id be heartbroken. i just hope this turns into one of those credit card commercials where the dog hitchhikes in trucks and motorcycles to find his way home. but in this commercial, the tagline would be “fuck delta. you’ll still find your way home”
I don’t like PETA but heck I’d get them all over this. This is terrible!
OMG! This is the kind of thing that would make me freak the f out. They don’t even know where to start looking for the little guy!! Just, painful. I hope this turns out well. Do update us, Consumerist!
That is the cutest puppy ever, damn the money I hope he makes it to Canada, or at least somewhere, safe. Screw you Delta, just ugh… now words for this.
I’ll have to double-check, but I think that Delta is the airline that once lost her dog.
Turns out that they sent the dog to the WRONG destination airport. Some kind soul eventually noticed that the dog was just sitting there in his carrier for a very long time with nobody coming to claim him and made some calls.
I’m pretty sure that my sister got a nice, cash refund out of it, not a stupid voucher. And they actually FOUND her poor dog.
Does Consumerist have any good contact info for a PR-type person at Delta? I’d like to express my disgust with them and my vow to no longer travel with them if they don’t make this right, but that’s different from a customer service sort of complaint.
(And I know some comments above me mention vaccination/quarantine issues…but…shouldn’t Delta know if that’s what happened? And shouldn’t they be telling Josiah that?)
Would it have been much better if Delta had only lost part of the dog?
This is almost too gnarly to be true…but sadly it is. I am really curious to see if and how Delta responds. My guess is some Delta (or other airport employee) in Mexico stole Paco and then came up with the story he just ran off. Either way, Delta’s half-ass offer is unacceptable. $200 (which is only good on their crappy airline) does not equal the life of a beloved pet. I generally don’t get wrapped up in theses PETA type situations, but nothing pisses me off more than terrible customer service. I have 4-5 trips planned this year and was going to fly Delta just so I could have non-stop flights; won’t be doing that anymore. I’ll take the layover just to ensure they never get another damn dime of mine!
He probably died in flight. It happens. The pet “getting out” is covering themselves.
Well then they are complete fools, since saying “we did everything properly but your dog died on the flight” actually makes Delta sound less bad than whatever is going on here. People generally understand the in-flight risks when transporting animals, whereas what is described here is a whole new and more sketchy level if incompetence.
Wow…Delta’s lost my business.
I have no words for this story. This is beyond incomprehensible…beyond appalling, its unfathomable…. wow. Just wow. I truly cannot think of a word sufficient to describe this story.
Speaking as a huge animal lover and longtime SPCA member….If this were my pet….Delta would NEVER EVER hear the end of it from me!! I would be at every news outlet, every newspaper, facebook, twitter (you can bet this story is going on my feed)…I would be the biggest thorn in Delta’s side! Pets are family members as much as another human, in my opinion. DON’T let them get away with this, Josiah!!
OR – someone else decided he was cute and loyal and kept him…
I would be calling a lawyer. Talk about adding insult to injury. Mexaco City? I hope Paco is not now ingredients to a taco.
Why? WHY?? Why did you post this when I’m 8+ hours away from seeing my dog? That’s it… I am not leaving him again… until Monday morning that is.
Seriously, there is so much hate in my heart for the evil monsters who either orchestrated (e.g., dognapped) or couldn’t care less about this.
As of right now (~1145 EDT), this story is the only hit for “Delta Dog” on Google News. Hopefully it will get picked up and rebroadcast widely — Delta should not get away with this.
Wherever you are, good luck to you Paco… you deserve better than what you got from Delta.
This is a new low for an airline.
Next: Delta loses child, offers refund on child’s ticket (child flew for free).
I noticed that he was told the dog was being cared for by a Delta employee. My guess is, that the employee opened the crate to let the dog out for a walk and he ran off.
Either way, this is just horrible. I don’t know what I would do if an airline lost my dog. I do know this much, I wouldn’t just accept a $200 voucher. I would say fly me back out there to go find her.
Where’s PETA on this one?
I think I would have immediately demanded a return flight to Mexico and not left the airport until they gave it to me, and when I got there I would not leave THAT airport until I found my dog.
My heart goes out to Josiah & Paco and I hope they are reunited soon, somehow.